


True Patriotism

by rach320



Category: Captain America (Comics), Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Steve Rogers and the 21st Century, and america, and how steve rogers would actually feel about modern day america, and i was like no way would cap stand for that, and then this was born, i vent about politics, please read a comic, yeah so I saw some less than savory people using cap to prop up their discriminatory views
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-04
Updated: 2018-07-04
Packaged: 2019-06-05 07:59:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15166175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rach320/pseuds/rach320
Summary: Steve Rogers, the kid from Brooklyn, has finally had enough.





	True Patriotism

For the first time since he had woken up after coming out of the ice, Steve Rogers felt lost. And that was saying something, considering that right after he woke up, he had to fight off an alien invasion. But the past few years of politics had left Steve feeling more lost than ever. 

 

Steve wasn’t disillusioned about his country. He knew that it had problems, had when he was a kid, and would continue to now. Steve grew up in Brooklyn, in a poor neighborhood, with disabilities that would have killed him had his mother not been a nurse because of the expense of just keeping him alive. He was a kid who was bullied because he didn’t fit what everyone told him a man should be: he was small, weak, preferring to draw bridges in his sketch book than holler after girls. He had seen that way that minoritized communities were treated, those deemed immigrants, foreigners, the Black communities, the gay community—though he had now learned the appropriate term was LGBT+. He knew that America wasn’t perfect; He had seen the first time the Nazis marched in New York, had seen how so many Americans, both civilians and otherwise, supported the eugenic policies—another thing that Steve later learned Hitler had taken inspiration for from American scientists and policies—until Japan, a German ally, decided to threaten America directly.

 

America didn’t start World War Two off as the hero gallivanting in to right the wrongs and save the day. He knew from his own experience in the military that the brass hadn’t cared about concentration camps and the Final Solution until they were forced to.

 

But he had continued to fight anyway because while maybe the military was just using him for propaganda, Steve wanted to fight against bullies; No matter where they came from. And the Nazis, Hydra… They were some of the biggest bullies out there.

 

When Steve had woken up, he had first been hopeful that America had improved.

 

And it had on many levels. Not just in daily life—medicine and daily quality of life had advanced so much for so many.  Science and scientists—when supported and listened to—had done incredible things.  The Civil Rights movements of the late twentieth century had inspired him. America was still a deeply flawed, prejudiced country, but the minoritized communities were speaking up and fighting back and slowly, the government listened.

 

But then Steve had dug deeper.

 

The disparity between the rich and the poor was only increasing, the country simultaneously being the wealthiest but having a significant amount of people below the poverty line, people like Steve had been growing up. People who died because they couldn’t afford the advances in healthcare, who didn’t get to go to college because it was too damn expensive no matter how smart they were. He saw that despite the Civil Rights movement, the KKK that he had despised as a kid was still alive and well. He saw bakers refuse the business of people just because they personally didn’t agree who they loved and saw people try to control women’s bodies and force one religion onto a country that didn’t have one. He saw politicians just as corrupt as they had always been, taking money from businesses so that the businesses could avoid regulations, often at the cost of the American people.

 

And slowly, Steve’s hope faded.

 

But he still had some. Because he met good-hearted American people, people who still fought the same fight that he died fighting for, who didn’t like bullies, no matter where they came from. So Steve decided that the country was still incredibly flawed, disappointedly so considering his seventy years under ice, but that maybe there was still hope.

 

That enough people understood the principle that he had died fighting for: _My country, right or wrong; If right, be kept right; and if wrong, be set right._

 

But then the 2016 election cycle started, and just how flawed American had allowed itself to become over the years had started to show, the slow decline that Steve himself attributed to the fear-mongering tactics of the McCarthy era, reaching a peak with a demagogue leading them.

 

Watching the election cycle was like watching a train wreck: horrible, but he couldn’t look away. Seeing Nazis marching in the street again, loud and proud and feeling emboldened by this man running for president. Seeing people proudly voting for this man, this bigot who called Mexicans rapists, assaulted women, and mocked a disabled reporter. It made Steve feel hopeless and simultaneously roaring with anger.

 

So when this idiot was elected, Steve looked up how. Maybe some of the American people had been swept away by the scapegoats this demagogue offered in place of the real problems in American society, but the popular vote went to the other candidate, an incredibly qualified woman that Steve didn’t quite understand why so many people hated her. So he looked into the electoral college, looked at exactly why it was founded—they definitely didn’t teach in school that it was founded to give slave owners more power—and got disheartened. HIs heart sank further when he saw the restrictions people had put against the checks and balances in the constitution. How was an electoral voter supposed to go against and demagogue and vote the other way when there were fines put against any voter who dared to go against his constituents?

 

And so then this man, this man who was showing more and more qualities of being an authoritarian every day, who showed more and more resemblance to the dictators he praised and had more and more evidence mounting against him colluding to win the presidency with the help of a foreign power, became president.

 

The good people of America protested every wrongful move made by the administration, the ones who stuck to the true ideals set forth in the constitution. But so many people supported him still, glad that they could finally be outwardly as prejudiced as they were internally, emboldened by this crass man who didn’t care about anyone but himself. And congress, the supposed check against the presidency, just let the erosion of norms happen, let the unacceptable behavior exist, all in the name of getting what they wanted through congress and living in denial of what a once respectable party had become, swinging it closer and closer to the Nazis Steve had fought against with every passing day.

 

But as infuriating as it all was—Steve spent most of his days shouting at the news it seemed—he had tried hard to remain hopeful. Because there were still people like him who saw the wrongs, who saw the flaws in America and wanted to fight to change the country for the better.

 

And then the straw came that brought the camels back.

 

Steve could deal with a lot of things. He could join protests and get his anger out that way, feel productive by joining the thousands of others protesting in the streets. He could deal with the hypocrisy of politicians and those who followed the current administration (fake news his ass) as long as he saw that the general American populace vehemently, strongly, and actively protested the bigoted policies coming out of D.C. with not even a shred of data to support their claims.

 

But then the administration had the gall to try to use HIM as their spokesperson, use HIM and what HE had fought for and those who had _died_ fighting for HIM in their twisted mission to make White Americans the only Americans, to imagine America back to a time where only straight white men with no disabilities had any power. A time where Steve himself was bullied because he didn’t fit the mold.

 

It was ironic. For all this country paraded him as a hero, they seem to forget his origins. They may have written the quote on the wall of the Smithsonian, but they seemed to forget it: _I don’t like bullies. I don’t care where they’re from._

 

And so, the straw the finally broke the camel’s back shattered with a bang, Steve calling a press conference.

 

Dressed in full Captain America regalia, he looked every bit the poster boy for the fake patriotism they had made him the symbol of.

 

And so, with news reporters from practically every agency in the country in front of him, Steve delivered what would likely be his last message as Captain America.

 

“It has been brought to my attention by those close to me recently that I’ve been used a prop by the current administration and certain senators to justify their policies. Now it’s not the first time I’ve been used as a piece of propaganda, but I’m not in the military anymore; you can’t just use my image without my permission: This country no longer owns me.

 

“So I will say that I disagree vehemently with every single last thing this administration has done. That I detest the policies they put forth and that the idea of nazis being elected to office, proudly yelling their anti-semitic, anti-diversity views makes me sick. I will not be used as a prop for policies that I disagree with to my very core.

 

“I chose to fight for my country in World War Two not because it was my patriotic duty, but because I hated bullies no matter where they came from. That includes bullies that exist on American soil. I was bullied as a kid because I was sickly, disabled. I got into fights because I didn’t like those who bullied me and I didn’t like those who bullied everyone else. I didn’t like those who bullied people of color and immigrants. I didn’t like those who bullied women and the LGBT community. I didn’t like those who bullied the poor. And I may not have been able to stand up to every government official back then who did those things, but I could at least stand up to the people on the streets who did. So when I finally got wind of exactly what was happening in Germany, of course I did everything I could to fight against those bullies as well.”

 

He took a deep breath. “But I’m not that sickly little kid anymore. And I finally have the power to stand up to all the bullies in the government.Because patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it. And right now, the American government does not deserve my support. America is nothing, _nothing_ , without its ideals—its commitment to the freedom of all people, regardless of gender, race, nationality, religion, ability status, gender and sexual orientation, all of it. Unless this country stands for _all_ people, not just those who look like them and talk like them, then American is a piece of _trash_. 

 

“A nation is nothing!” He yelled, slamming his fist against the podium. “A flag is a piece of cloth! America has always been a flawed country, just as all nations have been. But I supported her because I supported her ideals. The ideals that all men are created equal, that religion must always remain separate from the rule of law. Blind patriotism is not patriotism, but nationalism, a dangerous thing that allows dictators to rise to power. Unfortunately, I think we’ve already reached that point given what I’ve been seeing in the government today. But I hope that it’s not too late, that the good people of America hear me and fight back.

 

“Because this nation was founded on one principle above all else: The requirement that we stand up for what we believe, no matter the odds or the consequences. When the mob and the press and the whole world tell you to move, you job is to plant yourself like a tree besides the river of truth and tell the whole world— _No, you move_.”

 

Carefully, Steve removed the stars and strips from his old uniform. So many people didn’t realize that they were removable, that they weren’t a part of the suit itself. But now they would know, and they’d see him removing the very symbol of the nation from his uniform.

 

“I believe in the ideals of freedom and liberty for all, of equal opportunity for everyone, not just those who happened to be born into the right family. I believe in holding everyone, from the smallest store owner to the CEO of the largest corporation, to the president of the United States responsible for their actions and for how their actions affect their fellow citizens and the rest of the world. We move forward by standing by each other, by helping each other, regardless of where we come from or what we identify as. Diversity, and being accepting of it, is what makes a nation strong, not military might. Because no matter how strong your military is, it will fail if the people in the nation are not taken care of and given the same rights to life, liberty, and happiness.

 

“In the end, I think that James Baldwin said it best. ‘I love America more than any other country in the world and, exactly for that reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually.’ I am terrified at the moral apathy, the death of heart, empathy and open-mindedness, that I have seen happening in this country and watched how it evolved from the moment I went under the ice until now. And I will not let myself and my history and my suit be used as a symbol to justify that moral apathy.

 

“So, from this day on, I will no longer be known as Captain America and I will not fight for what America currently is. Instead, I will fight along the good and just citizens of this nation in its streets and I will protest alongside them. So for everyone out there despairing at the lack of adherence to the words in the constitution, crying out at the way that your country has seemed to want to move away from progressing and improving, I hear you. The kid from Brooklyn hears you. And Steve Rogers has your back.”

 

Steve finally looked right at the cameras.

 

“And one last thing: Fuck Trump. And fuck everyone who supports and aids him, including government officials and Vladimir Putin.”

**Author's Note:**

> So, happy fourth everyone! A lot of the quotes towards the end I took directly from Captain America comments. Don't like them, then stop liking the character.
> 
> Besides, it's my writing, I used the source material, and I need to vent about what the fuck is happening all around the world, but specifically in America.


End file.
